[Day 1] Group A: Jordan vs. Greece

[turk-jugoslav]

Any Greek center cannot produce more than 10 points against Spaniard centers.Pau gasol can easily make 25 pts 10 Rbs against big and slow Greek centers.Spanish centers are so far better than any European yeam's centers.Pau Gasol has been dominating Fiba tournaments for last ten years.Greece can beat any European team except Spain because they have super-class guards and clever forwards like Fotsis,Printzesis.Sofo/Bourousis/Koufos trio is not strong as you mentioned

[Olympiacos]

Any Greek center cannot produce more than 10 points against Spaniard centers.Pau gasol can easily make 25 pts 10 Rbs against big and slow Greek centers.Spanish centers are so far better than any European yeam's centers.Pau Gasol has been dominating Fiba tournaments for last ten years.Greece can beat any European team except Spain because they have super-class guards and clever forwards like Fotsis,Printzesis.Sofo/Bourousis/Koufos trio is not strong as you mentioned

Pau Gasol does not play center anymore for Spain. All the minutes at center are handled now by Marc Gasol and Ibaka. Besides that, Pau Gasol struggled in last year's NBA playoffs. He was just OK at the last EuroBasket, as Navarro completely carried him the whole tournament. There was never any domination going on last summer from Pau. This year, in the NBA playoffs, Pau Gasol was nothing short of terrible.

When you guys rate teams and players, you have to at least know who is still playing, and what their current level is, and what position they now play at.

[turk-jugoslav]

Pau Gasol does not play center anymore for Spain. All the minutes at center are handled now by Marc Gasol and Ibaka. Besides that, Pau Gasol struggled in last year's NBA playoffs. He was just OK at the last EuroBasket, as Navarro completely carried him the whole tournament. There was never any domination going on last summer from Pau. This year, in the NBA playoffs, Pau Gasol was nothing short of terrible.

When you guys rate teams and players, you have to at least know who is still playing, and what their current level is, and what position they now play at.

Maybe we are out of topic but I want to say that Pau Gasol is playing 4/5.He plays power forward when he is in court with his bro.Gasolless Spain is a quarter-final team.They were defeated by us in the last Eurobasket without Gasol.Ömer Aşık could fight Marc Gasol and I think Ömer beat him.If Gasol had played,they would have beaten us with big margin... Greek center rotation has same strength with Ömer Aşık/Enes Kanter/ Semih Erden. Greece has elite guard and it makes difference

[Victorious]

Maybe we are out of topic but I want to say that Pau Gasol is playing 4/5.He plays power forward when he is in court with his bro.Gasolless Spain is a quarter-final team.They were defeated by us in the last Eurobasket without Gasol.Ömer Aşık could fight Marc Gasol and I think Ömer beat him.If Gasol had played,they would have beaten us with big margin... Greek center rotation has same strength with Ömer Aşık/Enes Kanter/ Semih Erden. Greece has elite guard and it makes difference

I second that. And it doesn't really matter if Gasol is 4 or 5. It's the frontline as a whole that matters. And right now, Greece looks pretty good with Printezis, Kaimakoglou, Bourousis, Fotsis, Mavroidis, but they are going to fall short against some of the very best teams who have better frontlines and elite guards as well. Spain being one of them.

The fact that Spain is two levels lower without Pau says a lot of the importance of having a strong center.

[JGX]

Now I'm even more sad that the Philippines didn't make it to this stage. They couldn't possibly have done worse than Jordan and they would have made the IBN discussions a lot more interesting.

[mochoso]

Hey guys, let's not read too much into this. Greece hit a lot of their outside shots. When Greece is hitting their 3's well - no one can beat them. Not Spain, not USA, nobody. The problem for Greece is that normally, they struggle to hit outside shots and have weakness against zone. Although without Diamantidis, I always find that Greece has way better ball movement and thus handles the zone better.

When Greece is hitting a lot of 3's, no one beats them, not even Team USA. Greece beat Canada by something like 120 - 47 because they were also having a good shooting game from outside.

So let's not just take this score too seriously. I don't think Greece is necessarily a plus 44 against Jordan in a realistic truth. Just like they were not realistically a +73 against Canada. Then again, Spanoulis barely even had the ball and was hardly even trying and they still scored 107. But I think Jordan just gave up early.

Both teams tried to conserve energy after that like 21-0 run Greece had.



Everyone (well except USA) admits and knows that Puerto Rico has a very nice team and they are always tough. But how can you be so confident as this? Calm down man, and wait for the game. It should be a good game.

But I don't see any way that you can just flat out say Puerto Rico is beating Greece. You sound like those annoying NBA only fans that think a team's strength is solely based on how many NBA players it has.

I am not expecting any easy game for Greece, but come on, Puerto Rico has their hands full with Greece and they are the underdog.

l
Im telling PR is going to beat Greece by the fact that we may have the best 1-2 combo of the Tourney with Arroyo and Barea. This duo will drive other teams crazy and none can match their speed. But les see how we do in terms of foul trouble etc. That has been our downfall recently

[Dtown]

Now I'm even more sad that the Philippines didn't make it to this stage. They couldn't possibly have done worse than Jordan and they would have made the IBN discussions a lot more interesting.

This is what I was thinking the entire game, even if they had gotten blown out we would have gotten a few days of good chat out of it.

[J-Mart]

Officially rooting for Smart Gilas for WBC 2014!

[Psofimis]

Highlights

Interviews

Lol at vasileiadis.''Puerto rico are playing dirty...ahem..I mean in a basketball way ahemm

[sixama23]

Talking tactically, is obvious that Zouros tries to use many elements from Olympiakos in the team. Fast pace and switching players on pick on roll defence are just two of these. It's quite logical because most of the team's players were playing for Olympiakos last year and Spanoulis is also the leader of both teams. But even players from other teams such as Bramos, Kalathes, Vasileiadis and Kaimakoglou fits very well with this playing style.

Defending pick n roll by switches requires defencive versatility. I think this is what Zouros had in mind when he cut Vougioukas and still has when he is using Kaimakoglou as a center.

Baldwin was right. Greece doesn't have much inside game but the playing style that Zouros wants to play, doesn't need that much inside game.

[klakis]

l
Im telling PR is going to beat Greece by the fact that we may have the best 1-2 combo of the Tourney with Arroyo and Barea. This duo will drive other teams crazy and none can match their speed. But les see how we do in terms of foul trouble etc. That has been our downfall recently

Better than the guards of Greece?
Spanoulis,Calathes,Zisis???
I don`t know that well Barea but Arroyo is not better.

[Tasos Peiraias]

On Wednesday, Puerto Rico will beat Greece. They look strong today, but against a weak Jordan team.

Hmmm...No,my friend.History,papers and the game are with ous...You are the outsider
and you will try for the win.I believe that you wont manage to do very much

[Terrorizer]

Sofo and Koufos and Bourousis is the best offensive center rotation on the planet, but it leaves a lot to be desired on defense.

Why not in the history of basketball? Forget about Gasol bros duo with Fran Vazquez added, forget about Dwight Howard+Kevin Love+Andy Bynum - they can't match Greek epic centers. Also you all tend to forget that Pau has sucky play-off in 2012 averaging only marginal 12 ppg while mighty Koufos excelled in play-off with huge numbers of 0.7 ppg and 33.3% FGM.
Man, I understand that patriotism and loving your country and its national team is a good thing but you seriously need to stop writing megalomaniac bullshit if you don't want to loose all your credibility. In fact, even average national team like Australia has center rotation Bogut+Andersen+Maric+Jawai which definitely isn't worse than Sofo+Koufos+Bouroussis+Vougyoukas. Sofo is a great player who still is way too fat and slow and can play only limited time on the floor, Bouroussis is solid yet nothing to write home about and Koufos being athletic but so brainless sucks really hard anywhere he plays. That's not a dream center lineup, no way.

[Victorious]

Better than the guards of Greece?
Spanoulis,Calathes,Zisis???
I don`t know that well Barea but Arroyo is not better.

Don't forget Mantzaris. He is the third guard of the EL champions. A great defender and he can potentially do a good job against Barea and Arroyo. Not to mention that he can rest Spanoulis, Calathes and Zisis. These four Greek guards have a lot of experience. Having won either the Euroleague, Eurobasket or both (Spanoulis).
Also, we shouldn't forget Bramos who is a great defender as well. He can be used to put some pressure on the Puerto Rican guards. So Greece has five guards to stop Barrea and Arroyo. I think that, if anything, Greece is the worst team for Puerto Rico in the tournament, because they have the tools to stop their greatest weapons.

The last time Greece played them though, Puerto Rico was hard to beat. But under Kazlauskas Greece was not that good defensively.

[mochoso]

Greece guards cant match Barea/Arroyo duo. They can stop a few plays but they will get out of control when the dynamic duo starts their engine at full speed.. Cant wait for tomorrow